On Asteri
by oublie
Summary: Spock and Uhura are assigned to an exploratory mission that requires complete compliance with the strict cultural practices of a new planet, Asteri. Nyota struggles to adjust, and Spock decides that some matters must simply be taken in hand.
1. An Assignment

Disclaimer: Star Trek and all associated characters are not mine.

Warning: Strong M: language, dialogue, and characters taken firmly in hand.

A/N: With fondest dedication to Mishi-bishi.

~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~

"You're _kidding_ me, right?"

He tilted his head and gave her one of those looks that he reserved for her more peculiarly human moments.

"I am not. The planet is just as I've stated."

"How do you know?" she challenged petulantly. "Have you _been_ there?"

Spock raised one perfect eyebrow.

"I have not. But Lieutenant Ransom has given a full report, and I see no reason to doubt her account."

Nyota paced her corner of the room for a moment, caught herself, and dropped despondently down on the bed.

"And why did our esteemed captain decide that _I_ should be the one to suffer through this particular ambassadorial exchange?"

Spock watched her remove a boot and kick it carelessly to the side - an outward expression of her agitation, he surmised.

"Because he is well aware that your skills in linguistics are - "

"Unparalleled. Spare me." she interrupted, unzipping the boot's twin and casting it away as well. She crossed her arms over her chest and they both stared at the floor in silence until she spoke again. "He didn't have to pick me." she said, eventually. She sounded forlorn, and so Spock crossed from where he stood and sat beside Nyota at the bed; in periods of upset, he often found that he could calm her simply by increasing his proximity. She looked up at him through wide, dark, worried eyes. "Did he say who would - "

"I have volunteered to lead the away mission." he interjected quickly, wanting to prevent speculation. Although Spock did not feel it necessary to share the full extent of his thoughts with Nyota, he knew that he was far too protective of her to allow anyone else into such a position.

She blinked at him, then looked away.

"Good." she said, but something in it rang untrue and Spock felt a pang that surprised him and made him lean back from her, just slightly.

"Would you have preferred someone else?"

"No." she answered, sulkily. "If I have to pick a…tormentor, it might as well be you." she looked up at him again and he was momentarily stranded in her eyes. "At least I know I can trust you."

Spock had no words that truly reflected thoughts in his head at that moment, and so he looked at her very seriously and said: "You can _always_ trust me, Nyota." suddenly, fervently, and the uncommon expression of his emotion gave them both pause in a moment of companionable discomfort.

Then Nyota smiled and gave him one of her mischievous, sly grins.

"Can I trust you?" she teased, raising one skeptical brow. "How can I be sure you aren't holding some sort of a grudge against me?"

Spock felt confident that this was one of the semi-rhetorical questions that she sometimes asked when she wanted to elicit a behavioral response. So rather than speak his answer, he reached for her and drew her into a kiss; as always, she welcomed him, and the brush of her warm lips against his own gave him a momentary feeling of weightlessness. She leaned forward - a movement of intent, and he felt something which was not quite an emotion, but better an instinct, rise within him. In the periphery of his vision, he saw her shift and separate her legs beneath her skirt, and all was lost.

As a Vulcan, he would always be stronger than her; on occasion, she claimed that this was an unfair advantage, but he pointed out that it was only logical to use one's strengths to attain one's goals. She laughed, and told him that he might become a bully.

As he leveraged himself above her, using one leg to wrest his way between her artfully perfect thighs, he wondered if that were the case now. He paused, and looked down upon her, splayed across her bed, and decided that he simply did not care. Nyota would never refuse him, and so questions of coercion were irrelevant. She was his, and to touch her was his right.

She was responding, as she always did, and Spock felt a need of such urgency that there was no time to undress her; his hands pushed her skirt unceremoniously away to reveal her to him. Beneath her uniform, she was wearing the things he had bought for her, and this inflamed him further. Uhura took in a quick, startled breath when his cool fingers touched her, then arched her back as he laid tongue to skin at the juncture of hip and thigh.

By then, Spock realized that he had grown heady on an odd mixture of emotions; whether they were hers or his, he was unsure…but the outright violence of his desire to possess her made him suspect himself. Vulcans loved deeply, and he was no different. In the old days, they had fought and killed for their mates. Sometimes, Spock mused over the ferocity of his love for Uhura and wondered how far past those days truly were.

He pushed cloth aside to taste her, and the touch of his tongue to the sweetness of her pussy made them both groan. She squeezed his shoulder, and he grasped her around the waist to pull her closer, making quick movements at her peak with his tongue that he knew would drive her mad with sensation. She arched and whined for more; he delved in more deeply, feeling the connection between them buzz with heat and desire.

Nyota cried out and lifted her hips when he grazed gently over a particularly sensitive point - he lingered there another moment, letting her tension build. Her legs trembled and her hands at his shoulders grew more insistent, but she still waited for him to set their pace. Spock paused, then dove in again to press tongue to flesh, laving her, striking every weak point that made her yelp and twist and sway closer to the edge. He found his favorite spot - just at the head of her slit, where any touch would make her gasp his name - and slid his tongue roughly across it, feeling his rough texture against her softness. She made a little sound and he knew it had begun, and then she crested on the wave of her orgasm, and cried out and arched her back again and clung tightly to him and came.

~:~

"So you're going to have to…what, tell me what to do?"

Spock shifted uncomfortably in the bed beside her.

"No. The situation appears more…complex than that."

He could sense her confusion.

"Complex like how?"

"The norms of the Asteri appear to depend heavily on expression of the _sa'kal-tepul_."

Nyota frowned. Four Vulcan dialects and she'd never heard this phrase before.

"I'm sorry?"

Spock shifted again, and she could tell that he was uneasy with their conversation.

"I believe it best translates as the 'masculine power.' It is a word which refers to the dominance of male over female during the _pon farr_." he was silent for a long minute. "But the occasions for its use are very, very few."

The insularity of Vulcan sexual culture continued to surprise Nyota; there were so many rituals, practices, traditions, and now _linguistic artifacts_ that had never been written about - never even shared, as far as Spock knew, with an outsider. It was a private affair, he reasoned with her, and the _pon farr _moreso; because of this, he rarely answered her questions.

For humans, Spock supposed, who experienced emotion in a constant, endless wave, sexual passion must seem mundane. For a Vulcan, whose life was built on the stability of reason, it was a frightening maelstrom of sensation, both inside and out, that pushed one to the very limits of control. And, nature being what it was, this passion could not be avoided, eliminated, or tempered - it could only be survived.

Uhura was inching closer to him now; at some point, she had undressed, and now she was as naked as he beneath the thin blanket.

"So they expect you to show your dominance over me?"

Spock turned to look at her; in the lamplight, she almost glowed.

"First," he corrected her, "they expect me to _have_ dominance over you. Something," he mused, reaching out to splay his fingers through her hair, "That I expect will provide me with a most interesting challenge."


	2. A Discussion

There would be no easy way to do this. Spock had already accepted that fact. But that was fine; indeed, it was intriguing. Spock had never loved anything that came too easily.

He looked around; the bridge was exceptionally slow today, and would be for the next three weeks while the Enterprise remained in political and mechanical recess. Although the ship bustled with inspectors, visitors, engineers and scholars, the bridge crew were primarily engaged in personal leave - meaning that neither his presence, nor Nyota's, would be missed.

"Lieutenant Uhura," he said, suddenly, passing by her station as he exited the bridge, "Your presence is required in the captain's ready room."

She spun in her chair and looked up at him. Her eyes flickered, but only momentarily - she was reading what little she could of him through their fledgling bond.

"Right away, Commander."

~:~

He rarely addressed her on the bridge. And certainly not…_like that_. Uhura puzzled over the rarity of this occurrence as she made her way through the doors adjacent to the main chamber. The room was empty; she had expected this. Kirk was off-ship, at a meeting with the Andorian ambassadors, and most of the _Enterprise_ crew were currently on shore-leave - enjoying the brief period before a return to duty.

Uhura crossed her legs in irritation. The end of the recess would signal a return to duty that would be marked by her engagement in the Asteri mission. She was certain that the mission was the reason for her summons, and given their previous conversations, she did not look forward to further discussion.

Boredom set in, and she tried to signal her annoyance to him through their bond. The bond was a thing that still didn't quite make sense to her; it seemed to be both there and _not there_, intangible and transient in some particular way that she could not articulate. It had begun to form the first night they had spent together, but Spock had assured her that its potency would never reach the maximum until they had completed the bond in the formal Vulcan way. For now, it remained a tentative, temporary connection between them.

Uhura played with the link anyway, testing the strength of it when they were together and apart, curious about how much of her he could see and feel. Spock usually indulged her in this, with the exception of his meditation hours and their time on the bridge. All of Nyota's idle experimentation had given her an ever-growing suspicion that perhaps the bond was not as weak as Spock believed it to be. She hadn't shared this observation with him yet, as she found that sometimes it was more prudent to wait for the Vulcan to discover things on his own. She closed her eyes and thought of him, reaching out for the connection that she knew awaited her in his mind. Spock had told her once that although she read him poorly, she broadcasted extraordinarily well, and she hoped that was now true. If it was, perhaps he would hear her thought: _hurry up_.

Spock did appear presently, entering the room with his usual nonchalance and locking the door behind himself. Nyota's face took on a sulky moue and she glanced at the chronometer. He'd left her waiting almost 7 standard minutes - an eternity by her measure. It was an action very unlike him.

"Lieutenant," he greeted her and took up a position leaning on the edge of the conference table. In response, she sent a wave of annoyance through their bond.

"Commander."

He placed a data pad in front of her.

"Your SPA notes for the Asteri mission."

She blinked at him.

"Thank you, sir."

"I wish to discuss the mission further, to ensure your comfort with the assignment and your understanding of its accompanying missions."

Uhura raised an eyebrow, an affectation she had learned from the Vulcan.

"Thank you for that consideration, Commander…" she smiled sweetly, and Spock sensed her irritation, "…but I've already arranged a meeting with the captain regarding Asteri. After bridge hours."

Spock stared at her for only a moment, calculating and recalculating her likely meaning, before surging into action. He lunged forward and caught her around her waist, then from his superior position, dragged her upwards and forced her back so that she lay sprawled across the broad surface of the table, her wrists captured in his hands. Laughing, she tried to catch her breath.

"I've never seen someone get so sensitive about not being invited," she teased. Spock leveraged one leg between hers and leaned over her.

"Beaten, and yet you continue to taunt me." he responded placidly, then leaned forward to nuzzle the curve of her neck, giving a quick nip to her collarbone - a warning. "You have no need to meet with the _captain_ after hours when his commander is immediately available."

Uhura shrugged as best she was able and tilted her head as if in thought.

"Oh, I don't know. I thought he might have unique insight to share, given the wide diversity of his…skills."

Spock flushed a little green.

"Nyota," he warned, his voice low, "If you continue on this path, there will be…consequences."

Good sense told her to stop, but some foolish, mischievous spirit inside of her sensed sex and danger were around the corner and urged her to press ahead.

"Oh?" she inquired, dropping her voice to a purr, "Well. I've never been a cautious explorer."

Spock's eyes lit for just a moment, then returned to normal as he regained his sense of decorum. He released her and stepped back.

"Perhaps Asteri would be best discussed at a later date, Lieutenant."

Uhura sighed heavily and lowered herself from the table. Just like a Vulcan - leaving just as things got interesting.

"Fine. Then I am…?"

"Dismissed."

She turned on her heel, sent him a little mental flicker of her arousal, and left.

~:~:~

Spock had decided earlier that day how he should approach the Asteri mission with Nyota. His brief interlude with her in the captain's ready room had only strengthened his resolve.

There was nothing that would prohibit Uhura from succeeding in this mission just as she had succeeded in countless others; she was certainly adept enough, clever enough, and aware enough to manage the complex social requirements of the Asteri. The challenge lay in the fact that she didn't seem to _want_ to. Rather than undertake this engagement as an interesting challenge, she reacted with revulsion. Initially, Spock had presumed that she found the situation distasteful for some reason; however, further analysis had led him to conclude that that might be a dire misreading.

In coming to know Nyota intimately, he had found certain patterns in her proclivities. For one, she appeared to prefer him at his most elemental, when he exhibited behavior that was (to his Vulcan sensibilities) spectacularly _base_. Any expression of jealousy on his part won her attention immediately; an occasional bout of possessiveness seemed to delight her; a mild amount of sexual coercion would thrill her.

He had tried once or twice to initiate a discussion of this with her in order to better develop his understanding of a confusing behavior. Her reaction had been so drastically different from Vulcan women, who prized men for their stoicisim, self-control, and logic, that Spock had briefly lost all of the certainty he'd acquired over years of human interaction. Uhura had bewildered him with her ready engagement in his most contemptible behaviors, and he had wanted to know more. Always, however, his inquiries had been met with shy forestalling and conversational diversion.

Perhaps it was possible that Nyota's aversion to the Asteri was simply more of the same. Her resistance to the idea of submitting to him might be borne out of a strong desire to do just that, and if that were the case, then Spock felt confident he had a solution.

~:~

In keeping with her usual pattern, Nyota went to her quarters after shift to shower and change before going to meet Spock. She walked briskly along the winding halls of the Enterprise's residential quarters; there was no time to lose on a day such as this one. She had been aching for her sort-of-mate all day, and wanted to get to him as soon as possible.

As soon as possible turned out to be _immediately_, because when she opened the door to her quarters, he was already seated inside, still wearing his bridge uniform and reading over something as if he had all the time in the world.

She paused, because this was unusual and she wasn't sure how she felt about it, and then stepped forward.

"Well, hello." she greeted him, putting one hand on her hip. "What brings you here?"

He set the data pad down and looked up at her.

"You." he responded.

He rose from where he had been seated and came forward; in the small space, he reached quickly for her and surprise kept her from pulling back. They kissed, and he forced her backwards so that she bumped against the wall, pinning her there with his weight. He caught her face in his hands and Nyota felt the link between them begin to buzz with his arousal.

Abruptly, he released her.

"Go to the bedroom."

When she didn't move, he took hold of her arm and sent her firmly in his intended direction.

In her room, Spock seemed to gain greater certainty of his domain; he laid her across the unmade bed while he stripped himself. He dropped his uniform shirt halfway across the floor; his basic shirt followed. From his vantage point standing above her, he observed Nyota closely. It appeared that his behavior was already having the intended effect; her pupils had dilated, she breathed in an uneven pattern, and she lay poised and ready for him. He paused, shirtless.

"Strip." he ordered, and she complied immediately, pulling her uniform shirt over her head and unzipping her skirt to wriggle out of it.

Inspired, Spock stripped himself nude, his evident arousal catching her interest. She rose up a bit to reach out for him, and he came willingly to her, stretching his lithe body over hers across the sheets. He began slowly, bringing her close for a kiss before spreading his attention to her neck, her collarbone, the swell of her breasts.

Nyota tried to reach for him, but he pushed her hands away and made a low sound of disapproval that stopped her from trying again.

"Be still." he told her, and she whined but complied.

He spent some time exploring with his hands, teasing a nipple, testing the sensitivity of the skin of her belly, drifting between her legs to test her wetness. Nyota groaned and arched her back, playing the wanton, trying to elicit a more impassioned reaction from the Vulcan. He ignored this, pushed her hips firmly back to the bed, and made another of those disapproving sounds that she found surprisingly erotic.

After his hands went his mouth, kisses and quick nibbles across the length of her, and by this time, Nyota was growing frustrated with his pace. She lifted one leg to wrap around him in that particular way that she knew he liked - it was a small encouragement, but he seemed to take offense and pushed it away, then moved forward so that they were face to face again. His voice was firm; not angry, but definitely serious.

"Nyota, I told you to be** still**."

She tried, desperately, but he seemed to be taking _forever_, and just when she felt sure she couldn't wait anymore, he rose up and pushed inside of her, filling her with his heat and thickness. She cried out, which seemed to further excite him, and all of the frenzy he had suppressed was suddenly released; he thrust into her with a fierceness and depth that was almost difficult at first to take. He turned them over so that he lay on his back, their favorite position, and let her balance herself above him. Together, they made a rhythm - she lifted her hips to meet his strokes, and he went deeply into her and grasped her hips with a strength that excited her. Feeling her orgasm come close, he lengthened his strokes, drawing out her pleasure on him, taking the power from her hands and guiding her hips into the pattern he wanted.

At some point, he looked up unexpectedly and was caught off-guard by the utter beauty of her - an almost divine tableau when she was like this, unguarded and in sexual ecstasy. And she was his. She whined out his name, and he found he could wait no longer, and so he came, hard, inside of her. Nyota, who had herself been teetering on the brink of orgasm, felt this and fell fully over the edge.

~:~

Afterwards, they lay entwined in the sheets, Nyota splayed over Spock's chest, when he spoke.

"_Ashaya_," he began, and she smiled to hear him use these terms with her - these Vulcan endearments for a mate.

"Yes?"

"Did you enjoy yourself?"

She laughed.

"Of course."

He seemed satisfied with this, and there was quiet for a moment before he spoke again.

"_Ashaya_, when we leave for the mission - "

Uhura slapped him in the chest, sat up, and narrowed her eyes at him.

"I _knew_ it! I just knew this was about the damn Asteri mission. I knew it when you _growled_ at me."

Spock looked at her.

"Your certainty is well-placed. I wish to discuss the potential implications of our work on-planet. However, I did not _growl_ at you."

Uhura crossed her arms and drummed her fingers tensely.

"You did, but go on."

"As you are already aware, the sensitivity of the upcoming mission requires a certain level of diplomatic behavior be maintained by the visiting crew members."

Nyota blinked.

"Yes, Spock. I'm aware."

He glanced at her and she felt a probing through their bond which quickly retreated.

"As leader of the exploration team, I am responsible for all of its members."

"Including me." she finished for him, growing impatient with him.

"Including you." he agreed. "And given that fact, I find I am…dissatisfied with your preparation. The Asteri mission will be a challenging one, for both of us."

Uhura stared at him, unsure whether yet to take offense.

"Why?"

Spock reached out and curled the end of one lock of her hair around his finger.

"Because I know you well. And with me, you lack patience, you demand rather than ask, you are offended when you don't get your way, and you have a surprising capacity for sexual manipulation. All traits which, while occasionally endearing, must be suppressed while we are on Asteri." he looked at her more deeply, then reached forward to place his hands on either side of her face. "On Asteri, you must _obey_ me."

~:~:~

They decided to practice the next morning.

"Bring me my meal, _ashaya_." he said, pushing a gathering of her hair back from her face. Nyota laid on his chest and didn't move. He touched her back, gently.

"Nyota."

With what seemed to be great effort on her part, she sat up and looked him in the eye. He reached out to touch her face in response, sensing her discomfort and wanting to soothe her.

"It is only practice," he assured her.

She blinked at him.

"And when it's not?"

He was silent.

"This isn't fair, Spock." she complained, repeating herself. He observed her quietly; the best course of action, he had found, when she expressed this particular sort of human mood, was often to do nothing.

She dropped her head to his chest and lay still for several minutes longer until silently, she rose from the bed.

While she was out of the room, Spock reflected on the events of the morning and the night previous. Quick analysis led him to believe that this situation would require further direction from him; her mood was clearly a reflection of her continued ambivalence about the assignment, and would be unlikely to change without impetus.

Furthermore, her feelings about the mission were affecting her performance, limiting her ability to adopt new behaviors with the same fluidity that she had previously possessed. This was an unacceptable outcome, given the sensitivity of the assignment. There were potential risks in failure, not only to the acquisition of the dilithium from the Asteri and the development of a positive relationship between the new planet and Starfleet, but also to Nyota herself. The Asteri were not known to be a forgiving people (from what little was known of them); his mate's ability to blend seamlessly into their society would be critical, should any unforeseen challenges arise. Were something to go wrong, or if they happened to be separated, her very survival might be dependent on her circumspection.

It would be his responsibility, then, as both her mate and her superior to ensure that her behavior met the requirements of Asteri society - whatever they might entail.

Hearing footsteps as she approached his bedroom, Spock refocused his attention on the task at hand as he waited for her to reappear in his doorway.

"Nyota." he greeted her. "Come."

She was carrying a tray on one hip, and paused, then approached and set it on the edge of the bed, closest to his side. He reached out and attempted to draw her down onto the bed beside him; she pulled back and sighed.

"I think I'm going to shower and head back to my quarters. I really should get at least **some** work done before I go back on shift tomorrow."

He grasped her more firmly.

"No."

Her brow creased, just slightly.

"No?"

Spock released her, picked up the cup of tea she had brought him and took a sip.

"As we will be _fully_ engaged in preparation for our upcoming mission," he began, "You'll remain here."

Nyota blinked at him. This was out of the ordinary - she had never spent an _entire day_ with him. Hours, certainly, but one of them was always, inevitably, called back to work or duty. To spend an entire day? In his quarters? She wasn't quite sure what they would _do_ with all that time.

"OK. Well…what if I just went and came right back? We could start practicing around…" she glanced at the chrono, "1300 hours? Because I'd really love to do a little more reading on the early Asteri briefings, and I think I left the text of the original report in my quarters, so - "

"No." he answered swiftly, interrupting her. She looked surprised, and Spock recognized her behavior for what it was - a test, and a minor challenge of his authority. He filed this experience away for later analysis.

"But I - "

"_Nyota._" he interrupted her, firming his voice, "Do not force me to repeat myself."

Nyota paused again, more a little taken aback, and Spock felt a rush of mixed emotion through their bond - irritation and surprise and delight and an excitement that he found particularly intriguing. He set his tray aside and held out a hand to her.

"Come." he encouraged, and she went forward and found a space beside him on the bed. Catching her at the nape of her neck, he pulled her close for a kiss. She went, willingly, turning her face to meet his, her neck curving artfully and her hands finding a place on his thighs. They broke apart, and he regarded her appraisingly.

"I am pleased." he decided, and spoke it aloud even though Nyota had already felt this in their bond. Her gaze flicked up to him and she smiled for one quick moment, then fell suddenly shy and turned away. Spock returned to his meal.

~:~

"I'm _bored._" she complained, for what Spock counted as the seventeenth time. They were together on the sofa - he dressed in casual clothes and sitting, and she lying in the short uniform dress she'd worn the day before, her head on his thigh. He glanced once at her, then returned to his reading.

"If you require mental stimulation, then you should feel free to begin your list of activities."

Uhura narrowed her eyes at him.

"That list got deleted."

Spock reacted to this with a distinct lack of surprise.

"I see."

"Do you? It was ridiculous, and so it got deleted."

Spock paused once more and looked up from his work.

"Nyota, I suspect you are not taking our practice seriously."

"Well, I suspect _you_ are not taking _my protests_ seriously."

Spock raised an eyebrow. Perhaps she was correct. Perhaps he had somehow miscalculated her intentions, or misunderstood her communication regarding the issue. He tried to probe her a little through the bond, but met with a blank, firm resistance. Surprising - he hadn't taught her to do that.

"Lieutenant Uhura," he said, gently, "Would you prefer to be removed from the diplomatic team? If that is the case, I can file a report of - "

"No!" she sat upright to face him. "No. I just - " she stopped and appeared to be recollecting herself. Spock waited, and eventually, she looked up to meet his eyes again. "I can do it."

He set the datapad aside and reached out to touch her, to offer her some reassurance.

"I am certain of that fact." he told her, seriously. His hands found her shoulders, then her arms - her skin was smooth, and the seemingly infinite softness of it caught his interest. He felt the brush of her touch in his mind, and he let her feel the vastness of his desire for her; the early susurrations of his arousal thrummed through their bond. When they separated, she leaned forward, seeking more of his touch. He cooperated, repositioning himself so that they were closer and his access to her body was greater. They met again in a kiss and he caught her hips in both hands and pulled her into his lap.

Straddled over him, she felt her own arousal deepen as she exposed herself. Spock looked down at her wet cunt and his pupils dilated.

"I thought I instructed you to dress earlier?" he inquired. She shrugged.

"Didn't have a spare set, and you wouldn't let me go home…"

Spock made a sound of inordinate roughness.

"If this is the result, then my decision was correct. I prefer you this way." he commented, trailing one thumb up the length of her slick pussy.

Nyota grinned and arched her back a little, reaching for his waist to begin to undress him.

"Should I wear it on the bridge, then?"

Spock looked up at her darkly, then abruptly slapped her ass. Surprised, Nyota yelped and lifted herself from his lap.

"No." he answered her, simply, and felt the rush of her arousal through their bond. She smiled mischievously.

"Not even for - "

"Nyota." he interrupted her. "Do not tease me, _taluhk_."

"Perhaps I'm not." she said, seriously enough that it inflamed him, and Spock felt that familiar feeling - that powerful, heady sense of adoration and possession and desire and violence - well up within him, deeply rooted in his true Vulcan self, and he growled and threw her down onto her back.

He was inside of her almost immediately - certainly faster than she could respond to or anticipate, and she gasped with the fullness of him and arched and tried to grasp his shoulders. Spock made that sound again - the one that was rich with his virility and dominion and made her just feel like a simpering puddle of arousal. He thrust so deeply into her that she swore she felt it in her throat, and it just felt like _too much _and so she she put up her hands to his chest to try to slow him. Spock appeared to take this as a personal offense, and he growled again and slapped her touch away, then tangled one hand in her hair and forced her to bare her neck to him. She complied in a hazy mix of sensations and emotions - his cock felt so hot, so perfect and thick and _good_ inside of her, the sting of his hand on her ass and his grip in her hair thrilled her, his brute force frightened her.

She understood something of what he wanted through the bond, although the images and emotions came in such a torrent that she could only make out one word - _submit_. He seemed to be repeating it, over and over again, until all she could sense through their bond was his demand, his dominance, his carnal power over her. He had won; he had bested her, and she was now in his possession, under his dominion. She should just _submit_.

With a groan of frustration, he released her hair to push her dress roughly up, scrabbling to get her out of it. Freed, he spread his hands across her dusky skin, scraping his fingers over each nipple in a way that was just sharp enough to make her whimper and plead with him for more. She tried to sit up, but his hand on her shoulder forced her back down, and he pushed himself into her with greater force. She moaned and tightened the grip of her leg on his back and he felt his peak nearing.

"Nyota," he ground out, urgently, thinking at first to warn her, but then not really caring. She would take whatever he gave to her; that was her place. Something feral inside of him grew more powerful and Nyota, feeling a whisper of it, opened her eyes to meet his. Feeling bold, he opened their bond and plunged deeply into her mind; her thoughts were sex-muddled, but one word spoke clearly to him. _Yours, _she told him. Satisfaction came in a rush, and he felt all control slip away. With another powerful inward thrust, he crossed the edge and burst inside of her with a groan; as always, she followed him into orgasm, writhing and crying out as he filled her with his hot cum.

He held her for several minutes afterwards, their positions reversed so that he lay on his back with her long limbs draped across him, relishing in the afterglow of sex with his mate. He felt peaceful in these moments; he had the quiet mind he sought when he meditated, and with Nyota lying pleasantly beneath him, her satisfaction coursing through their bond, he felt something closer to blissful.

It was unlike anything he had felt before; this peace felt deeper, more thorough, as if the most primal parts of him had been satiated and now were brought to heel. The undercurrent of discomfort, of emotion, of upset and confusion that were typically only supressed meditatively now appeared to be gone. He began to ponder the power of the _sa'kal-tepul, _but the depth of his innate contentment were such that he simply filed the thought away for later exploration and focused his attention again on the present. Nyota felt different, too, from what he could detect through their limited bond. She was sleeping now, off and on, but there was some particular type of calm emanating from her; he pinpointed it - she felt _secure_. This pleased him, too, but he did not speak it aloud for fear of waking her. Instead, he reviewed his memories of their act through the bond, hoping to share with her the source of his greatest pleasure.

_Yours_, she said. _Mine_, he thought.

Asteri would be a fascinating experience.


	3. Debrief

Spock met her for breakfast in the mess hall. As was their custom, she arrived before he and selected their table. This morning, he found her at one of the two-tops in a far corner of the main hall, gazing out into the stars. He paused briefly at the entrance, her beauty arresting him and making him struggle to recall a piece of poetry he had read in his youth. The name of the author soon came to him: he had been a human called Byron. Knowing this, Spock moved forward with satisfaction.

As he took his usual position across the table from her, he noticed that she drew back approximately 5 centimeters - little enough to go unnoticed by anyone but him. This was unprecedented behavior on her part. On the contrary, he often found that Nyota seemed compelled to position herself closer to him than necessary in their interactions. Withdrawal from the sharing of one's personal space could be understood to reflect a discomfort with the proximity - or even mere presence - of another. Spock reflected on this with some consternation. Lieutenant Uhura had never expressed discomfort in his presence, and particularly not since they had become lovers. Spock tilted his head just slightly.

"Nyota?" he inquired, "Is my presence unwelcome?"

She looked up at him in surprise, then away again.

"Of course not. Please sit."

Spock raised a skeptical brow and observed her for another moment. She appeared lost in thought; her food was untouched. Spock lowered his voice and attempted a second, more personal approach.

"K'diwa?" he began, "You appear…troubled."

She shrugged and turned to look at him.

"Just thinking, Commander."

~:~

His disconcert with her strange disposition extended further into the day. On the bridge, she was her same efficient self, despite the banality of another uneventful day spent docked in port. Spock kept a mental log of her activities as she went about her day, feeling that this was the most logical means by which to gain insight into the puzzle of her uncharacteristic behavior.

At 0930 hours, she arrived at her station and began work on a translation of the Cardassian texts that had arrived with the Andorian diplomatic envoy three weeks prior. She worked for approximately 1.5 hours before changing tasks.

At 1100 hours, she began work on re-organizing the nested subunit files as part of an ongoing effort to improve accessibility. Spock noted that although this work could be done more effectively through the newly-implemented automated system, Uhura appeared to prefer to deconstruct the units manually. Perhaps this was indicative of a troubled state of mind; both Vulcans and Human shared the use of repetitive tasks as an aid to gaining mental focus.

At 1230 hours, Spock completed his mid-shift review of the bridge crew's work, and requested that Lt. Uhura reassign herself to translating an older Romulan text with an urgent deadline. In response, Nyota stared at him for approximately 2 seconds longer than would be expected - too brief to be noticed by the rest of the crew, but long enough to make an impression on the Vulcan.

"Yes…_sir_." she responded, then turned back to her work and began again, working as diligently and methodically as ever.

Spock watched her for another moment, deliberating his options, then rose and left the bridge.

~:~

"You wanted to see me, sir?" Uhura inquired as she entered Spock's office.

Spock looked up from his desk, expecting to catch a glimpse of some sort of emotion in her expression that would indicate to him that he was on the correct course of action. Uhura's face revealed nothing to him, however, and so he indicated that she sit. As he did so, he realized how unfamiliar the action had become; he had become accustomed to her settling into his space automatically. Spock filed this observation away for later consideration.

After she had seated herself - neither her expression nor her physical position revealing anything further about her emotional state - Spock began.

"You are in distress."

He used no form of address, allowing her to determine the formality of the interaction. Uhura continued to look evenly but blankly at him.

"No, sir." she answered, but a small decibel drop in her voice led him to suspect that this was a lie. He raised an eyebrow and reached out to her through their bond, surprised to feel her politely but firmly push his mental contact away.

"Your behavior would indicate that you are experiencing some form of… agitation."

Her eyes shifted away, then back to him.

"Has my performance been affected, sir?"

"Your performance has not."

"Then is there anything further you wish to discuss with me, Commander?"

Recognizing the formality of her tone, Spock determined that now was not the time to continue their discussion. Nonetheless, his own fears had been assuaged. The abrupt onset of Nyota's distant behavior had initially troubled him; however, her reluctance to allow him access to their bond indicated that the distance was artificial, and verified that her distress was indeed emotional. Spock thus recognized this behavior for what it was: rebellion. And it would not be tolerated.

"Nothing further, Lieutenant." he said, mildly. "You are dismissed."

~:~:~

Lieutenant Uhura returned to her quarters after her shift at approximately 2100 hours - 4 hours later than her usual time, and 3 hours later than Commander Spock had predicted she would arrive.

She did not appear surprised to see him lounging on her sofa; in fact, she seemed to have anticipated this.

"Commander. What a surprise." she greeted him, with an intonation that Spock recognized as ironic. Rather than respond immediately, Spock maintained focus on completing his review of the current section of the Enterprise maintenance report; when he had finished, he set it aside and looked up at her where she lingered by the door.

"Nyota." he answered, and stood. She blinked at him.

"Can I help you with something?"

Spock's mood darkened a little and he stepped toward her.

"Enough, _k'diwa._"

She expected him to try again to touch her mind, and so prepared herself to shield her thoughts - but after a moment's waiting, she felt nothing. Frustrated, she shielded herself anyway. She wanted him to _want_ to know what was going on in her head, but apparently he was uninterested in her thoughts. She adopted a purposefully casual stance, shifting her weight onto one hip.

"I'm sorry, Commander, I don't - "

"_Enough."_ he repeated, and before she could speak again, seized her and brought her forward for a deeply passionate kiss. When he released her, she was momentarily dazed, and he took the opportunity to slip beyond her shielded mind and reach delicately through their bond. He caught a second's glimpse of her mind - glowing warmth, curiosity, happiness, amusement, anticipation, delight, a powerful confusion, a smug feeling of self-satisfaction, a vague sense of unease, embarrassment, a potent anxiety, a deep savoring of satisfaction that appeared to have developed recently, and a feeling so foreign to their relationship that he required a moment to process it - _fear_. Then it all disappeared as quickly as it had come and he felt a sensation distinctly like being _hurtled_ from her mind and when he met her eyes, she was scowling at him.

"That was **rude**."

He tilted his head.

"My apologies, Nyota." he answered, but she continued to scowl at him. "I undertook such action only out of concern for your well-being."

"You were prying." she countered. "And you tricked me."

Spock did not respond directly to this; instead, a moment of silence passed between them before he said:

"You are afraid of me."

Even without the benefit of the bond, she felt a rush of all the emotions she had never wanted him to feel with her - rejected, unwanted, unwelcome, hated, _feared_. Although Nyota wanted so badly to be angry with him, in the face of such abject despair from her mate, she found herself unable.

"I am _not_ afraid of you, Spock."

"I felt - "

"It's just - " she interrupted him, then realized that she was unsure what she wanted to say. "It's just something I feel _in general_." she finished, lamely.

Spock observed her for a moment, then pulled her in for another kiss - this one unhurried and sweet, more of an inquiry than a demand.

"Explain." he requested. Nyota sighed.

"I suppose," she began, hesitating before finding her footing, "I'm afraid of what's going to happen to us on Asteri. And afterwards, for that matter. What if we do something that permanently changes us? Changes our relationship? I don't want to ruin this, or lose it, or make things uncomfortable between us." she looked up at him, hoping he would understand. "I don't want to lose you."

"A Vulcan does not choose a mate lightly, Nyota." he said, placing his hands on either side of her face. "And it cannot be undone."

Wanting to believe him, Nyota reached tentatively through their bond and felt the power of his words and the truth in his promise; she felt his protectiveness, his concern for her, his own confusion and hesitation, his rising desire, and the dark stirrings of masculine power that awed her. Most of all, she felt the depth of his love, and it soothed her.

They remained that way for several long minutes, standing pressed close together in the small space between her entry door and the narrow table, each languoring in the other's mind. Spock pulled away first.

"However," he began, his voice firming, "I have found your behavior over the past 14 hours unbecoming my communications officer, and unacceptable of my mate."

Nyota looked up at him with an equal mixture of surprise and wariness.

"Spock - " she began, but his expression grew significantly more serious, and she fell silent.

"Your behavior must be redressed." he continued.

Nyota looked apprehensively at her suddenly-stern mate.

"And how do you propose - "

"I am going to discipline you."

"Spock!" she yelped, startled, and tried to pull out of his grasp; with one hand, he held her firmly in place.

"I will not tolerate rebellion, Nyota. Nor shameless attempts at manipulation which, while ultimately ineffective, have the undesirable effect of distraction."

Her face flushed, but she resisted the urge to pull away from him.

"OK. Fine." She patted his wrist placatingly. "I was a distraction, and I'm sorry. But we've talked it out, and everything's going to be fine now. So enough - I don't want to do this… Asteri thing anymore. No more games."

Spock tilted his head and in the angled light of her quarters, his eyes appeared shadowed and unfamiliar.

"It was never a game_, _Nyota."

"Fine, _practice_ - whatever it was. I just…" Trailing off, she looked up and felt the powerful compulsion to peek into his mind - just for a moment, just to glimpse as much as she dared. A moment was long enough; through their bond, all was laid bare. His desire for her, for this; the powerful feeling of the _sa'kal-tepul_; the heady, intoxicating idea that perhaps she might understand him, might even _want _him this way. Last, she felt the low, consuming, ecstatic, passionate satisfaction when he realized that she did.

"Spock, I - " she trailed off, finding nothing to say.

"Nyota."

Spock read her face for a moment more, laid a brief kiss on her lips, and then released her.

"Go to the bedroom, _ashaya_."

~:~

In the dark, he was just a silhouette - shapeless, shifting, and impossible to understand in full. Nyota had been too afraid to reach the short distance between her bed and her table to turn on a lamp, and so she had waited in the shadow of the main room's light for his arrival. Spock appeared in the doorway, arriving with the same casual composure that he always had. She looked up at him, and her face was a mélange of emotion - none of it comprehensible to him.

_She has never seen me like this_, Spock reflected, _Never under the thrall of the sa'kal tepul._

Before he could consciously consider his actions, his mind directed him to go to her and so he did. He came to stand in front of her and saw, even in the dim light, how her muscles tensed and her breath quickened.

"Spock - "

"Lie prone, Nyota."

She blinked wide, startled eyes at him and swallowed.

"Well, maybe we could - "

Before she could finish her sentence, Spock had crossed the small space between them, caught her under her left arm, and pulled her roughly to him. Thrown off-balance, she put out a hand to catch herself and found herself flipped onto her belly, sprawled inelegantly over his lap and the bed. Startled into inaction, she lay still with the cool standard issue blankets pressed against her flushed cheek.

"I do not brook arguments." he said. Then, quietly, an additional word: "seven" …and he began.

The first touch of his hand to her bottom merely surprised her; she had no time to anticipate the blow. The fall of his hand a second time stung sincerely, and she balked and thought of pulling away; what kept her in place was unclear. On the third strike, she hissed and squeezed the bedlinens into a crumpled mess beneath her right hand. She anxiously anticipated the pain of the fourth strike, but instead, he paused.

"Nyota."

She made a sound that was the derivative of her intended response. If he was amused by her inarticulate answer, he didn't show it.

"What have you learned?" he asked, voice neutral as ever - as if she weren't upended, panting over his lap as he _spanked_ her.

"To - to, um - "

SLAP.

"Try again, Nyota."

"I can't think when you're - "

SLAP. He waited.

"This really doesn't work on me, this - "

SLAP. He hit her twice as hard as before, and she yelped.

"OK! I learned that you 'don't brook arguments.'"

He raised an eyebrow and slapped her exposed ass again.

"OW! Seriously? Fine - I learned that you're a - "

SLAP.

"One more opportunity, Nyota."

She wasn't sure she wanted to know what lay beyond that final chance, and so she answered quickly.

"I learned not to disobey." she blurted, and half-turned to get a glimpse of his face, to see an affirmation that her punishment was over. His eyes narrowed, and her heart skipped a beat.

"Me." he corrected her, his tone growing more commanding. "You learned not to disobey _me. _I am your mate, and you belong to no other."

There was something ritualistic in his words, in the way he spoke to her, in the swirling miasma of desire and dominion that she sensed at a distance through their bond.

"You." she repeated, hastily, "Just you."

"Good." he said, and released her so abruptly that she almost fell. She tried to regain her footing, but found her legs surprisingly unwilling to support her and so she collapsed onto the bed beside him. He laid down next to her, took hold of her arm, and pulled them close together, drawing the thin heat blanket over them. When they were settled, he pressed his forehead to hers, his silent way of saying _I love you. _She reached one leg forward and entangled it between his; this was her silent response.

After a few moments of this, she reached out through their bond, and found that he came to her easily - more easily than before. The rush of his mind into hers excited her, and she put a hand under his black shirt, slid it along his side and found the protrusion of his pelvis through his skin. This was her favorite part of him; this place where her slim hand fit so perfectly over his hip, into the small crevice of the meeting of torso and thigh. She held her hand there for a long moment, just circling lightly with her fingertip. Unexpectedly, she dipped her hand across his belly and felt gratified to hear his breath catch. He made no move towards her, however, and his latency both frustrated and emboldened her.

She pushed the shirt up towards his chin until he understood her demand and removed it. In the low light, the faint flush of green over his skin was less evident than usual, but the tension in his body was unmistakable. He wanted her. Her hand wandered down his belly and brushed against his cock. He wanted her, badly. She disentangled her right leg and hooked it over his hip, drawing him forward. He went, willingly, but remained a passive participant.

_Why?_ she inquired through the bond.

_It is your turn to take control_. he returned, and she smiled quietly and returned to her exploration.

His ribcage was a sensitive spot; two quick nips along the ridges there had him at full attention and grasping for her. The space just below his belly button was another; she drew a winding line there with her finger as she kissed him, and his cock thickened and surged, desperate to be inside of her. She caught his hips and pushed him away, felt a blaze of his irritation through the bond and laughed. She took him in her mouth next, swirling the head of his cock with her tongue, lapping in all of his heat and pleasure and taste, wanting to memorize every part of him and every moment they had together. Spock arched and thrust into her mouth; she slapped his hip and he stopped.

When she finally climbed atop him, he groaned and didn't care whether this was undignified or not. Her undulations were inspired; to hold her was divine, and to be stretched out like this with his hard cock sunk deep into her tight cunt and her skin glowing with the warmth of their joining was sacrosanct. She gasped and reached out for him, catching his arm; in the throes of her orgasm, she moaned and lost her head and left marks on his skin where she gripped him too tightly. He didn't care - in the midst of her peak, she had opened herself to him, fully, and he felt the outpouring of emotion and ecstasy at the same time she pulsed tighter around his hardness, and he was drawn irreversibly towards his own conclusion. Groaning, he arched again, lost himself, and came.

~:~

When she woke, it was with the alarming realization that they had only 3 days left in port, and just 5 before they reached Asteri.


	4. Rainforest

The next day, Nyota rose early to drink her tea and watch the stars. Spock, who always woke before her, had already gone; a datapad placed precisely in her line of sight on the coffee table told her that he had gone to the meditation gardens. Uhura scanned the note and found further instructions: she was not to leave his quarters before his return.

Naturally, this was the first of many commands that Nyota would not obey.

Spock had decided long ago that the meditation gardens would be his escape. He had stumbled across them during his first week on the_ Enterprise_, when they were still just the unruly results of a horticulturist's abandoned experiment room. But now, with time and tending and the captain's approval, they had grown into a beautiful escape - a place of serenity for him and many other crew members. The gardens had become a growing, collaborative thing, and each day that Spock arrived, he took interest in examining the newest changes. Stones added to a sand garden; fish swimming in the pond; a section of the room separated and dried out to mimic a desert landscape.

Today, the changes were minor, and so Spock catalogued them quickly, then moved on to find his usual meditation place on a flat stone set between two red boulders that reminded him of home. Spock sat, opened himself to his mind, and found his thoughts filled with Nyota - he felt ragged with the effort to understand her, to move her, to love her. Spikes of emotion attached themselves to the most sensual of his memories, and sinuous waves of feeling rose and fell as he reflected on the past few days.

Suddenly feeling a lover's anxiety, he reached out to her through the fledgling bond, and was satisfied to detect a peacefulness that indicated she might be sleeping. He would leave her sleeping a little while as he completed a few of the necessary tasks that preceded the Enterprise's return to active duty, then return to his quarters to continue her training for the Asteri mission.

An unanticipated spike of emotion rose in him, and he settled it ruthlessly. There was no time for weakness during such critical preparations, and although Spock felt certain he had been weakening lately. His control over his feelings had begun to feel tenuous, uncertain. It felt strained to the breaking point more frequently than usual; skewered through with tiny needles of sentimentality. Spock pondered this for a moment, but no longer.

Uhura tried. She really did, but after showering, dressing, reviewing her notes, and spending a few hours working on projects leftover from the pre-docking work, she found that she simply couldn't take it anymore. She managed to put off the inevitable a little while longer by tidying up, then by playing a game or two on her PADD, but there was only so long a girl could be expected to hold out. Who knew when Spock would be back? She could probably head home, change, get some exercise, get cleaned up, write that letter to her mother, and be back in his quarters before he was even off-shift. Spock would be none the wiser.

Shortly after 1100 hours, she gave up, picked up her bag, and headed out the door.

~:~

Spock settled into his preferred spot for meditation in on of the portside gardens of the Enterprise; the simulated red sand pooled around him. Seeking a point from which to begin his meditation, he reflected on Nyota.

The two of them had spent the previous night in a delightful state of mental synchrony, the lingering effects of which had left him with an uncommon sense of serenity and balance. Now that they were apart, he found himself illogically yearning for her, despite the residual calming effect.

He reached out, more out of habit than true inquiry, to find her and caught a glimpse of her mind before she abruptly and alarmingly shut him out. Surprised and confused, Spock retreated from their link and his meditation, returning to his awareness of himself, of the meditation gardens, and of the red sand beneath him.

~:~

That had been close - _too _close. Resolving to have better control of her barriers, Nyota continued down the hall towards her quarters. Part of her was desperately curious to know what Spock was doing now; had her abrupt termination of their link alarmed him? Had he considered it yet another of her many human quirks? Was he engrossed in something else - meditation, perhaps - and not even fully aware of her actions? Or was he, even know, _at this very moment_, standing up, scanning their link, and deciding to come searching for her?

Nyota wasn't sure, and paused in the hallway for a moment of indecision. She could go back now - let herself back into his quarters, undress, climb back into his bed and be pretending to sleep soundly by the time he arrived. That option, however, entailed a particular requirement that Nyota felt unprepared to meet: the acceptance of defeat. If she caved now, she would sacrifice her only leverage; once he knew (or believed) that she _could_ behave, he'd never relent. All would be lost, and she wasn't yet ready to yield without a fight.

The only course of action, then, would be to run.

~:~

Spock returned, completely unsurprised, to empty quarters. Before he'd been ejected from their link, he'd caught a hint of Nyota's emotional state, and although he'd at first been unable to give name to the sensation he'd experienced, further reflection had allowed him to understand it. She'd been feeling a mixture of fear, anxiety, and a heady kind of delight that Spock had aptly translated as _rebellion_.

So she had found her orders, and had deliberately disregarded them. Spock scanned the room; she had left in haste, but he found no indication of injury, no note to explain her absence - nothing to suggest that circumstances beyond her control had forced her disobedience. She had left, apparently for no reason other than to experience the delight of resisting his command.

The only logical response, Spock decided, would be to go after her.

~:~

Nyota hid out in her quarters for all of seventeen minutes before nervousness overwhelmed the early excitement she'd felt. She showered, quickly, and went to change, but her bedroom felt too tight, suddenly - too enclosed. He would find her here, and she would be trapped.

_He'll find you no matter where you go, _her thoughts reminded her mutinously. _He'll find you and then he'll be mad. _Irritated by her own anxiety, she dressed quickly and gathered a few items into a shoulder bag.

_That may be._ _But first, he'll have to find me._

~:~

There was something particularly beguiling about this…situation that Nyota had created, Spock decided, as he paced the room, pondering where to chase his quarry next. Not since his early adulthood on Vulcan had he had the opportunity to engage his senses and abilities in such a way. The pursuit of a fleeing target; the hunt of escaping prey - these were experiences that spoke to the deepest part of both his human and Vulcan halves, and Spock felt a shimmer of the same powerful awareness he'd been feeling since their Asteri practice had begun.

An idea occurred to him, and he paused in his pacing to consider it. If logic held, then he felt certain he would know where to find her. Exiting his quarters swiftly, Spock began his pursuit.

~:~

Having abandoned the safety of her room, Nyota rushed to the forward deck, planning to hide out among the returning crowds of crew members, visitors, and friends. She had neglected to recall, however, that the forward deck would be closed in preparation for the return ceremonies that evening, and found herself skidding to a halt at the 'Do Not Enter' sign hovering mid-hallway.

She felt a tingle of awareness at the back of her neck and realized it was Spock, probing through their bond. Ruthlessly, she shut him out, heart racing with realization that he was after her.

She couldn't go back to her quarters. She considered going back to his, wondering if doubling back would confuse him, or even give her an opportunity to play innocent, but couldn't conceive of a path that would give her safe passage through the halls. Forward deck was closed; where else could she find a crowd?

~:~

There was something darkly, delightfully primitive about this hunt. Spock recognized this, but had no time to consider it as he paced the hall in front of her empty quarters. Frustration rose within him, briefly, before he settled it in favor of logical analysis. Nyota's gifts were in understanding the organized patterns of language and behavior; although she could be an adept leader, she was not a strategist by training, and would be unlikely to lead him in a complex escape.

Furthermore, her flight had been hasty - or at least he presumed that the disarray in his quarters indicated so. If this were true, she would have been limited to a swift choice of strategy, and most likely would have chosen a familiar pattern of escape. His initial presumption that she had decided to "hide in plain sight" had been incorrect - she was not in her own quarters, nor was she in his.

Her next option would have been to seek refuge in a crowd - with the forward decks closed until the evening, her only option would have been in the recreation areas. Spock took off in that direction, something savage and carnal rising within him and spurring him onward.

~:~

Halfway to the recreation deck, Nyota had the unsettling feeling of being nearly caught. She changed her destination in the lift and hopped out at a residential floor to rethink her plan. Maybe crowds were a bad idea. Who knew, after all, how committed the Vulcan was to this pursuit? The last thing she needed was to be tackled in public by the ship's second-in-command. In private, of course, would be a different matter.

So maybe she should take the opposite approach - find someplace far and isolated. It'd certainly be more difficult for him to find her there; he'd never be able to anticipate where she'd gone. Decision made, Uhura turned on her heel and headed for science & engineering.

~:~

In the lift to recreation, Spock caught her scent and knew he was close. A rush of desire flashed through him; he began mechanically to shut it out, but something - perhaps some lingering element of Nyota's experience - prevented him from doing so. Feeling rebellious himself, he let the desire rise within him, thinking of Nyota, of their encounters, of what he would do when he caught her…

~:~

Nyota felt the hum of connection again, and realized that he was growing more insistent. She closed her eyes and eased her guard, just momentarily, just out of curiosity - to try to discern for herself where _he_ was. The rush with which he entered her mind surprised her, and it took her just a few seconds longer than she'd anticipated to shut him out again.

As if closing the door against a storm, she felt overwhelmed with the power of his lust; she paused to catch her breath. Had that come from her Vulcan? He had felt like a man possessed. Nyota felt her own cunt grow damp with excitement. And what had he seen in her mind? Only impressions, surely - that was all they could transmit at this early stage. Anything to give herself away? Nyota didn't think so, but then again, the Vulcan often surprised her.

She checked her location and decided she'd made a good choice, after all - despite her now burning desire to be caught, she still wanted to win whatever game this was they'd begun to play - and she knew the perfect place.

~:~

Spock had figured out, by this point, exactly where Nyota was. Calculating the time it would take him to reach her hiding place on the science deck, however, he realized that if he did not trap her, he would lose her.

Yet, Nyota appeared to have a weakness, too - the onslaught of his lust in her mind had stunned her more than momentarily, and ignited a fire within her as well. It was, Spock reflected, that lovely human receptiveness that she always displayed; that delightful manner she had of being always wet for him, always ready, always reactive to his touch.

He sent a tendril of arousal through their link and was surprised to feel her response - heady, quick, and full of heat. Images accompanied the sensation; she was alone, she was in the gardens, she wanted him to take her now, here, to be inside of her and pounding her against the raw earth.

Startled by the power of her desire and the ferocity of his own response, Spock spared only a moment's thought to whether he might actually be losing control before he stopped the lift at the next floor, got out, and ran.

~:~

Nyota stopped for breath inside the first door she found unlocked, heaving and trying to readjust her understanding of the chase and where she was going. _He's trapped you, _the little voice in her head assured her. _You're caught_.

_Not yet,_ she retaliated, but then felt the probing pull of him reaching through the link. She resisted, but suddenly he seemed more powerful than usual, than he had been before - she relented just a bit, giving just enough ground to avoid fully yielding, but doing so gave her an intimate peek into her lover's mind.

He was above her, within her, surrounding her, one strong thigh thrown over hers; her back arched - he was cumming inside of her, his shoulders powerful and stiff, his nose buried in the scent of her. Mesmerized by the vision, she suddenly found she had lost track of why, exactly, she was running from him again. Certainly her lover, her Spock, her _mate_, was exactly who she needed at the current moment.

Stepping further into the humid heat of the rainforest near the entrance of the meditation gardens, she inhaled deeply the peaty scents of plant and earth. It would be delightful to have him here - to ride him and feel him so deeply inside of her and to feel enveloped in _life_, in growth and beauty and the creation of living things. Another tingling snaked its way up her back; she had the sudden awareness that he was nearing her, anticipating his prize. She found a secluded area and went barefoot across the grass there, towards a little pond by the stars.

The fewer clothes, the better. He'd find her and she'd be ready for him. Nyota began to undress, moving deeper into the greenery.

~:~

Spock reached the meditation gardens in record time, his heart pounding uncharacteristically, his skin already sensitized, cock aching with the want of her. He caught her scent here, too, so powerful that she must have been just moments ahead of him. His fingers nearly trembled as he opened the door, had the computer scan the blessedly empty room, and locked it. She was caught.

He hesitated then, wanting to savor this last victory, to find her on his own - free of the duplicity of the bond, free of the confusion of desire. Where would she have gone? Part of him longed to go to the red sands, to the place where he found his peace. But Nyota would not have gone there. Where, then? To the small patch of long, dry grasses that may have reminded her of her own home? No. Understanding dawned over him; she was seeking something new; some new creation. Growth. Life.

He found her lying naked in the forest.

~:~


	5. Waiting

The following afternoon, she and Spock reconvened in his quarters for lunch and tea, dining on a simple Vulcan soup he had made in days prior. The soup was cold, but slightly spiced, and after a few spoonfuls, Nyota found herself desiring a glass of water. She began to rise; Spock's hand on her wrist stopped her. Although he released quickly, the strength of his grip left a clear impression. She sat.

Without looking up from his soup, Spock spoke.

"I have not given you permission to leave our table, _ashaya_."

Nyota sighed in irritation.

"Well, mother-may-I - "

"Nyota." Spock's voice had a bit of steel in it, and the unspoken threat settled her. She rolled her eyes and tried again.

"Spock, I don't feel like - "

"Three offenses, I believe, is the number most commonly accepted before punishment in the human tradition." he said, conversationally. "Is that not the case, Nyota?"

She was quiet for a moment, although she narrowed her eyes at him.

"_Husband_," she began, in her most respectful voice, "May I have - "

Spock raised a single brow, and she stopped to try again.

"Husband, may I _bring_ _you_ some water?"

Spock looked up at her, a placid expression on his face and an uncharacteristic heat in his eyes.

"Of course, wife." he answered. "And once you have finished your meal, you may retire."

Nyota gave him a coquettish duck of the head.

"As you wish."

~:~

After he had taken her twice more, they found themselves sated enough to spend an hour or so focusing on the more mundane details of the Asteri behavioral protocols.

"For a society with such limited technology, they certainly have developed some major complexities in social interaction."

Nyota commented, reading for the fifth time a paragraph detailing the way in which food and material gifts could and should be given between unmarried women of different societal status.

Spock did not answer; he, too, was engrossed in consuming the preliminary notes. After a moment, he looked up at her.

"Lieutenant, what is the appropriate response if an unrelated woman of the third caste speaks to you, unsolicited?"

Nyota squinted for a moment, trying to work out the trick in his question. She puzzled over this one for a moment, before coming to an answer.

"I grant her acknowledgement, but do not hear any query nor make any agreements, offer a gift of _maltak_, and seek my husband at the earliest opportunity."

Spock gave a quick tilt of the head, indicating his approval.

"Excellent."

Nyota beamed. Although one or two of the intricacies of the Asteri social system still escaped her (How could _anyone_ tell whether it would be appropriate to give the greeting of the maternal or the paternal third cousin at a glance?), she had learned quite quickly most of the complexities of the culture.

Putting her knowledge into practice, of course, would be another matter.

~:~

Despite the fact that her attitude had improved immensely following her capture in the gardens, Nyota still seemed to encounter some challenges in the full adoption of Asteri behavior. She had already been disciplined twice today - the first time, she had forgotten to walk rear-right of Spock in the hallway, and as penance, he had required her to spend an hour practicing her Andorian diction with the most boring texts imaginable.

Her second infraction had come when she'd interrupted his conversation with a rather long-winded Lieutenant to ask whether he'd like lunch in the forward deck or at home. In this case, Spock's strong look and the threat he'd issued by tightening his grip on his glass had been enough to remand her behavior. She had slunk away and pouted until he'd threatened, more explicitly, to put her over his knee in the hallway. She had been exemplary in her behavior since then.

Spock, to his credit, was a fair leader. He asked nothing of Nyota that she was incapable of giving, nor did he punish without warning and without attempting to improve her behavior through instruction. The few times he had spanked her seemed at this point to have made an impression, such that even the threat of his hand was enough to alter her position on any variety of topics.

But Spock was also a strict leader, and issued a constant series of reminders - she should be aware of her posture; stand behind him; never speak over him; not be argumentative or unpleasant; never take from him something not explicitly offered; and never leave his presence without his permission.

Adept as she had become at satisfying his requirements, Nyota still had a powerful spirit and a naturally wild heart, and Spock found himself equally admiring and exasperated of her. There was something else that he felt about her, too, but it still seemed so far and unfamiliar that he had trouble identifying it. It moved through his mind as a predator through the shadows - waiting.

~:~

Reuniting with the crew came with a rush of commitments, both social and professional. Despite their plans to continue their practice, Spock and Uhura both found themselves overwhelmed with the responsibilities of resettling the ship and preparing for a return to active duty.

Their last day in port was spent in a flurry of paperwork and inspections, all of which seemed to conspire to keep the two lovers apart. Although Spock reached out to her through their bond several times a day now, Nyota still found herself missing him. She yearned for his touch; her skin felt hot with the need of him. On the bridge, she struggled to focus, too busy recalling the scent of his skin and the feel of his thick cock inside of her, driving her to climax.

On occasion, they would pass each other in the halls, and he would whisper simple words to her in Vulcan - short, efficient phrases that nonetheless gave her vivid visions and made her eager cunt clench in anticipation.

~:~

Kirk called them into a meeting of the senior bridge crew after hours. They arrived separately and took seats; Spock was lost in thought when Uhura arrived. He did not look up to greet her. Unperturbed, Nyota reached out to brush his mind, as was her custom greeting for him.

This time, however, she was surprised to feel what seemed to be an inky void where his well-ordered thoughts usually lay. She gasped quietly, and pulled back, out of his mind, then checked around to be sure no one had seen her reaction. Spock was staring at her from across the table. His mind had felt…unfamiliar, and disorienting, as one might find a childhood home with all of the furniture moved. She probed again, and as quickly as the strange, dark, slippery spot had appeared, it vanished. Spock's mind had returned completely to normal, and he was casually reading over a PADD on the opposite side of the conference room.

Uhura blinked at him for a moment, but said nothing, and eventually returned to her own meeting notes, casting only occasional, concerned glances up at Spock.

~:~


	6. Tested

The return to duty jarred them both. Remnants lingered of their little practice sessions; Spock seemed more alert than ever to every flip of Nyota's hair, each turn of her wrist. She found herself feeling constantly watched, even while they were each ostensibly occupied with other things.

Nyota, for her part, struggled to control herself. The low brogue of his voice made her tremble; the heat of his gaze thrilled her; the firmness of his commands made her want to arch her back and spread her legs for him.

As she worked at her chair, she would feel the occasional buzz of their link, and would turn to find him staring intently at something else, his hands ghosting sensually over the screen, his chair, his thigh. Twice during those incidents, she had sent a flash of her own arousal at him through their bond, and was surprised to find it met with his much, much stronger desire.

That night, in her quarters, she confronted him.

"Something's different about you."

Spock glanced up once from his reading, shifted the PADD to his left hand, and tapped his right leg once with a single finger - an indicator that he wanted her to come and sit. Now in the habit of compliance, she obeyed and crossed the room to settle herself on his lap.

"What appears to be different about me, Nyota?"

She shook her head.

"Not 'appears to be' - 'is.' I know. I felt it."

He actually stopped reading now, lowering the device slowly.

"What did you feel?"

Uhura tried to focus on remembering the experience enough to describe it; she furrowed her brow in concentration.

"It felt like…a dark spot. Like mercury, spilled. Slippery. Elusive. Confusing."

Something flickered across Spock's eyes, but it was gone quickly. He raised the PADD again and resumed his reading.

"I am certain it was simply a misinterpretation on your part. If you would prefer to access our bond again now to verify, you may. But you can be assured that all is well."

Nyota drew up a little, feeling slighted. A misinterpretation? On her part? She frowned a little, trying to pinpoint her sense of unease. Spock's concise assessments didn't typically affect her in this way, but something had been different; his words had seemed…intentional. Provocative. As if he were baiting her.

Uhura had been fortunately born with a mind capable of examining a massive number of complexities and nuances simultaneously; she put it now to work analyzing all the data she had available about Spock's recent change. Moments later, she had a working theory. But, like any good scientist, she would need to test it.

~:~

"Nyota."

Spock's voice was superficially calm, but Nyota's careful ear was able to pick out the exasperated stretches between the syllables of her name - the landscapes of emotion he painted into every vowel. Serenely, she answered him.

"Spock."

"What is the purpose of this activity?" he asked, curtly, taking another step into his quarters.

She simply smiled in a beatific way and kept her eyes closed.

"The purpose, my love, is to clear my mind. To center my thoughts and find release from the distractions of - "

Spock interrupted, obviously impatient with her obfuscation.

"What is the purpose of undertaking this activity while nude, _tal'kam_?"

Nyota shrugged one elegantly bare shoulder.

"Your quarters are warm. I was more comfortable."

Then she met his gaze, boldly, and smiled.

Spock stared at her for one long, uninterrupted moment that seemed to stretch beyond the normal boundaries of time. Nyota's heart picked up speed, but she kept her posture willfully calm.

Then, as a dragon wakened after a long sleep, he moved. Spock never moved carelessly; he was a man of intentions, and his intentions appeared in every shift of muscle, in every unbroken gaze. He was atop her in seconds, knocking her off balance and stretching her backwards to lay across the floor. Nyota's breath caught as Spock threaded his fingers through her hair and drew her neck backwards, exposing her throat to him. Her smile crossed from blissful to impish, then back again as he pressed in closer.

Against her skin, he ground out:

"You are teasing me, _k'diwa_."

"Me? Never."

"Nyota." he snapped, in a voice too gritty to be even half-human, and she only had time to be briefly surprised before he had a hand on her hip and the room shifted and she was suddenly lying on her belly with a particularly serious weight straddling her thighs and a particularly strong hand pressing down between her shoulderblades.

She made a little moan of surprise, and caught with one ear Spock's intake of breath in response. Curious now, wanting to know whether she'd been right, whether the dark spot was indeed connected to this, to his arousal, she reached out along their thin bond. Immediately, she found it - right at the forefront, in a place shallow enough for her to reach, even with their weak and immature bond. She tried to focus her attention on it, to draw mental fingers along that spot of pitch; that slippery rolling-over of unlit emotion. Nyota felt victory, then a frisson of fear - why had she never felt this before? Perhaps their bond was growing stronger. Perhaps he was revealing more to her. Perhaps -

Abruptly, Spock shut off the bond, forcing her attention back to their physical contact. His shielding was slower than usual, however, and for one further, brief moment of linkage, Nyota sensed confusion and then despair and then an all-consuming need. Then Spock blinked and was himself again, the swirling cloud of mystery within him gone, and Nyota once again left to focus on all the places where he was touching her.

The hand on her back flexed as he stretched his fingers over her skin.

"This attempt at provocation is unacceptable, Lieutenant Uhura. Were we on Asteri, it would almost certainly require immediate correction," he paused; then, with an edge of speculation, added: "Most likely corporal."

Was he threatening to spank her?

Nyota tensed, recalling their previous sessions, and suddenly wished she'd been a bit more subtle about this tease of hers. Spock was quiet then, but his hands spoke for him, and in them, there was something that was too clever, too knowing, too aware. Nyota felt exposed beyond her physical self, and squirmed between the confines of his legs. Spock made a low, humming sound that she correctly took to be a warning; she stilled.

"We are not yet on Asteri." he said, reassuring her. She let out the breath she didn't realize she'd been holding. "But there are rules nonetheless." he added, and the hand that had been pressing into her back shifted to her shoulder, while another slid from her hip to fit the curve of her ass.

He drew back, and although Nyota knew what was coming, she was still powerless to stop herself from crying out at the first strike of his hand to her ass.

"Five." he said, simply, and she nodded.

By the time he was down to two, she was biting her lip to keep from panting and digging her fingers into the carpet to keep from reaching out for him. One and she gasped out his name, which was not allowed and so he added three more and she made a little sound of protest but then was quiet.

After the last strike, he stopped and slid one hand all the way from her shoulders down over the crest of her ass and to her thighs. She hissed as he crossed sensitive ground, but said nothing.

"I will not accept teasing, ashaya." he said, and his voice was that same low, possessive growl that she associated with the darkness in their bond. "Not here, and not on Asteri. Now give me what is **mine**."

And then he was using that superior Vulcan strength in that way he had that frightened her and aroused her and lit every animal edge on fire. He nipped her, between her shoulderblades, and she gasped. Vaguely, she could sense Spock fumbling with the zip of his uniform - _fumbling? but he never fumbles_ - and then his weight was heavy atop her again and his cock was a bar of heat, pressing against her sensitive rear.

She tried to spread her legs for him, but wasn't fast enough because he made a sound of dissatisfaction (later he would deny, again, that this was a growl) and grunted as he pulled at her hips to raise her. Nyota went fluidly as ever, stretching her arms so that those slim muscles of her back flexed and drew his attention down, down to the dip of her back and the curve of her ass and then without preamble he thrust and was inside of her.

The contact was so sudden that she yelped, and Spock paused to reach for her through their bond. She felt concern and arousal and a fierce emotion that seemed too alien to be of any use to her; she dug around for the ink spot, but it seemed to have dissipated, and although confused, she abandoned it to focus on the matter at hand.

Spock took her with long, easy strokes - their positioning was not ideal, but Spock's balance was impeccable and he soon set a pace that pleased as much as frustrated her. She whined and arched her back, but this did nothing to speed his pace and so she focused her mind, collected all the thoughts she had of _his cock his arms sex touch me love desire make love to me harder wet so wet_ and pushed them out in the vague direction of their bond.

Spock's head snapped up and he went still. Worried, Nyota tried to half-turn to see him, but before she could, he snapped his hips and she was caught up in the sensations she'd craved; he was thrusting inside of her, marking her, striking her, laying claim to every depth and inch of her and she loved it. The hand which had been pressing her down crept up from her back to tangle in her hair and she arched her back to bare her neck to him; he growled, but refused the prize in favor of changing his angle to bury himself farther in her, deeper, to the hilt and out and in and out again; he lost his rhythm and his thrusts became desperate, clinging, grasping to her and he made that sound again and she felt her own peak nearing.

He was relentless; she felt herself a small ship crested on the wave of his arousal, riding his power without reprieve. She bit her lip and wanted more, more, more, and then unexpectedly, her orgasm overcame her and she cried out and clenched on his cock and moaned and he growled and laid himself over her and his thrusts became frantic as his mouth found her neck and then he was cumming, powerfully, and holding tight to her overwarm skin.

~:~:~:~

Nyota tilted her head in the mirror.

"Well. It's not so bad, really, now that I look at it. Definitely not worth stopping in to Sickbay for." she spun so that she faced him and lazily crossed one leg over the other. "I'll cover it up, and it'll fade in a few days."

Spock met her eyes, and Nyota thought she saw something flash in them, but it was gone before she could look twice and he was back to his normal expression.

"Nyota, I apologize - "

She held up a hand.

"Spock, please. It's just a love bite. You don't have to apologize." She grinned, cheekily. "I enjoyed it."

Spock blinked at her.

"Nyota - "

"Spock." she crossed her arms over her chest, and her expression became serious. "I'm fine. And in two days, we'll be on the planet. Maybe - maybe a little token of your affection is a good thing."

Spock furrowed his brow, but said nothing further, and she turned back to the sink.

"Besides," she added as she checked her reflection again, "What's the big deal about one little bite?"

Spock did not answer her; she simply lingered in the doorway silently, watching her carefully cover the mark and prepare to report to the bridge.


End file.
